"…this wondrous ocean"
In a 1921 letter to Alfred Steiglitz, John Marin writes of fame, friendship, and happiness."Just now I am in my boat. She's running tolerably well.… My pipe's in my mouth. I am on the sea and I haven't an ache or a pain and I am well, tolerably happy. I know when I reach home I'll find the table set.… But I am not home yet, am here, and if it weren't for the effort I'd pinch myself so that I might realize the good time I'm having. Would I have any of my friends here with me now? Well it would be a temptation for I might take the chance to pitch the parts of them I don't like overboard. As for my enemies, well, they're in the wake out there my boat is making. Do I want to be big or great or do I think I am big or great? Oh say now, look out around at this great tremendous fathomless expanse, this wondrous ocean—and don't ask fool questions."
— John Marin
Source: American Impressions: Masterworks from American Art Forum Collections, 1875–1935, A Book of Days (Washington, D.C. and Rohnert Park, Calif.: National Museum of American Art in association with Pomegranate Artbooks, 1993).
Pictured: John Marin, 1870–1953, The Sea, Maine, 1921, watercolor and charcoal on paper, 16 1/2 x 19 5/8 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase.
In a 1921 letter to Alfred Steiglitz, John Marin writes of fame, friendship, and happiness."Just now I am in my boat. She's running tolerably well.… My pipe's in my mouth. I am on the sea and I haven't an ache or a pain and I am well, tolerably happy. I know when I reach home I'll find the table set.… But I am not home yet, am here, and if it weren't for the effort I'd pinch myself so that I might realize the good time I'm having. Would I have any of my friends here with me now? Well it would be a temptation for I might take the chance to pitch the parts of them I don't like overboard. As for my enemies, well, they're in the wake out there my boat is making. Do I want to be big or great or do I think I am big or great? Oh say now, look out around at this great tremendous fathomless expanse, this wondrous ocean—and don't ask fool questions."